Blade width - 3mm or 4mm - what's your preference?

[falcon]

I was shaving feather sticks at the weekend and trying out different blades. I was OK (eventually) with 3mm scandi blades (Bison, Lapplander, Pukko) but was better with a 4mm+ blade (F1) convex. Overall I find the 3mm blades more "nimble" but there are times when the heavier 4mm blade really shines with heavier tasks.

So, there's the F1 and the Woodlore at 4mm thickness and a wide range of 3mm blades all of which are popular, not forgetting the Frost's Clipper and Svord at 2mm or so. What's your preferred thickness width and why ???

 

[leon-1]

Personally I prefer the heavier blade, it is more the feel of it than anything else. I just feel more comfortable using a heavy blade than a lighter one.

 

[MartiniDave]

Another vote for the heavier blade for the majority of tasks, although I do like the thinner blades for food prep like cutting veggies (no, not vegetarians!). I tend to have the Woodlore on my belt and a frosts in my pack - not to mention the opinel or swiss-army in my pocket!

Dave

 

[JFW]

Yes, I'm with Dave.
A heavy blade for big jobs and a thinner blade for food prep etc.
My current users are WS woodlore and a Lord Farquhar wren, I also take a No8 Opinel and a swiss army knife. This covers most of my cutting requirements, add to that a folding saw and occasionally a small axe. What a lot af hardware....

Cheers

JFW

 

[MartiniDave]

Nevr mind "Carry less by knowing more" I seem to be "Carrying more because I know there is more I can carry"

Oh well!

 

[Stuart]

3mm for me, I see little or no benifit from a blade thicker and heavier than 3mm and there is a down side to trying to force a thicker wedge into a cut

 

[bushblade]

The thickness of the blade won't really make any difference to how the blade shaves feather sticks but the angle at which the blade is sharpened will.

 

[Hoodoo]

3 mm for me.

A little bevel at the edge will help put a curl in your shavings. I learned this from twig carver Chris Lubkemann.

 

[Ranger Bob]

3mm puukko for me, thicker blade seem a bit too clumsy for carving to me, but then, I've never actually used a blade thicker than 3mm!

 

[JonathanD]

I'm all for the 4mm, if you use it exclusively you'll soon learn to do all tasks profficiently, even fine food prep.

 

[tomtom]

on a blade between 3 and 4.5 inches i would go for 4mm but on a smaller and even a larger blade i would go for 3mm

 

[Andy]

It should be noted that becasue the F1 is convex it's not it's full thickness for very long while a scandi knife will be.
I've never noticed a difference in blade thickness for making feather sticks other then the frosts mora knife which had a very shallow angle and tended to curl into the stick. I put a micro bevel on to sort this out, they come with a slight hollow grind that works out at about 13degrees per side. My thicker Trond blade doesn't have this problem.
I made the edge angle more acute on the F1 as it was the opposite.

 

[Moine]

For me, it depends on the job I need to do.

1mm Opinel (with the secondary bevel buffed out) for slicing...
2mm Scandi (Mora) for light cutting and woodworking/carving
3mm F1 or Howling Rat for heavier stuff that can damage a blade
5mm Camp Tramp for saplings and such "light chopping"
15mm Axe for tree cutting
50mm maul for splitting

Cheers

David

 

[Omega]

I will agree with the point that confort of cutting will depend how the edge was sharpened. However, the thicker the blade, the heavier the knife becomes and it is not convenient to do some works with heavy knives. I tried to peel potatoes using my Busse BA3 - three potatoes made my wrist quite tired.

Also, while testing Busse BM on wooden logs, I found interesting thing for myself - this knife is very sharp and heavy, therefore it easily gets into the wood, but then it gets jammed and not that easy to pull out. When I chopped with a lighter knife which also had thinner blade, I sometimes managed to penetrate to similar distance into the wood, but it was much easier to be pulled out. Speaking of the rate of chopping, they performed quite similar (but I must admit, BM is very impressive high quality knife!).

In my opinion, 3 mm is quite thick blade for an ordinary work, but for a heavy work is another story - you may wish to have thicker blade just for toughness. However, I cannot imagine a situataion that 3 mm knife failed you in normal live, even in emergency - it is still quite a thick blade! From the comfort point of view, I believe the thinner the blade the better.

 

[eraaij]

A 3 mm thick blade would be more than enough for what I do - normal bushcraft tasks.

That said, I prefer the handling and balance of my 4mm thick AW Woodlore with a perfect flat honed edge bevel. Overbuilt for the task? Probably, yes. But I tried a lot of knives and this one just 'fits' me.

-Emile